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Retail giant swats back at a conservative activist group ... In a steady parade of companies retreating from their diversity efforts, Costco Wholesale is standing out by holding fast. Ahead of its annual meeting next week, the warehouse retailer has urged its shareholders to reject a proposal .... Major companies from McDonald’s to Meta Platforms have faced pressure to reconsider diversity, equity and inclusion policies. That pressure has been amplified by anti-DEI boycott threats and ... In Costco’s case, a conservative activist group is pushing the company to compile a report on the risks posed by its initiatives. “It’s clear...

‘A lot of companies got way out over their skis on this, but the law hasn’t changed,’ Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti said.. After years of applying the progressive environmental, social, and governance (ESG) ideological framework to their corporations, executives appear to now be realizing that these programs could be driving their companies into a legal and financial wall. The past year has seen a growing list of Fortune 500 companies announcing that they are dropping race- and gender-based programs for their employees and pulling out of global net zero climate clubs. Companies that have announced they are canceling or...

Blackrock Inc. is the latest to announce it has left a United Nations-backed Net-Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA), among several within one month and not soon after Donald Trump was elected president. It did so as it and roughly 60 companies are being investigated by Congress for allegedly colluding as a “woke ESG cartel” to “impose radical environmental, social, and governance goals on American companies.” Last month, Goldman Sachs was the first to withdraw from the alliance, followed by Wells Fargo, The Center Square reported. Citigroup, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan next announced their departure. According to the "bank-led...

Less than three weeks ago, on December 23, in a post on optimism about the potential demise of the green energy fantasy, I took note that two of the largest U.S. banks had just quit something called the “Net Zero Banking Alliance.” The two were Goldman Sachs and Wells Fargo. These two banks, along with many others, including all of the biggest ones, had joined the NZBA as it was getting organized under auspices of the UN back in 2021. NZBA, together with other related groups organized around the same time, aspired to be cartels of financial institutions that would...

Blackrock has become the latest financial giant to take a step back from the Net Zero Asset Managers (NZAM) Initiative and its efforts to cut so-called greenhouse gas emissions to zero by the year 2050 or sooner. Blackrock, which manages $11.5 trillion in assets, joins a growing number of firms who are walking back their support for climate and Environmental, Social and Government (ESG) commitments. According to Reuters, NZAMI has garnered more than 325 signatories that manage more than $57.5 trillion in assets, all of whom have pledged to support the goal of net zero greenhouse emissions by 2050 through...

Another ESG rat jumps ship: @MorganStanley leaves the illegal Net Zero Banking Alliance . .. @Citi and @BankofAmerica abandoned ship earlier this week. .... What's melting: The illegal ESG cartel. Citigroup and Bank of America drop out of the Net Zero Banking Alliance. ... After ESG and DEI are abandoned, what will be the next grift? ... Music to my ears! Climate change isn't something that can be controlled by human hands, and Net Zero is just a money-making scam. It's that blazing ball of exploding gas in the sky causing it dum dums, and there's nothing we can do...

Net Zero Watch is an affiliate of the Global Warming Policy Foundation, the UK’s leading climate-skeptic think tank. (Another affiliate of the Global Warming Policy Foundation is the American Friends of the GWPF, the organization of which I am the President and a board member.). The specialty of Net Zero Watch is poking holes in the UK’s insane pursuit of Net Zero greenhouse gas emissions. The Director of NZW is Andrew Montford. A few days ago (December 23), Montford issued a brief end of year statement that gives a good summary of where we are now in the climate wars....

My post on Saturday noted one big reason for optimism that the green energy fantasy is coming to the end of its run: the first country, Germany, has apparently begun to hit the green energy “wall.” Although Germany has never consistently reached even 50% of its electricity production from wind and solar, its ability to continue its green energy dreams has stalled: its electricity prices have soared, its manufacturing sector has been seriously undermined, its economy is in recession, and recently its green-promoting government has fallen. Its failed example now stands for others to see and avoid. And as I...

Not soon after the general election, and within two weeks of each other, two major financial institutions have left a United Nations Net Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA). This is after they joined three years ago, pledging to require environmental social governance standards (ESG) across their platforms, products and systems. According to the "bank-led and UN-convened" NZBA, global banks joined the alliance, pledging to align their lending, investment, and capital markets activities with a net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, NZBA explains. Since April 2021, 145 banks in 44 countries with more than $73 trillion in assets have joined NZBA, tripling...

In 2018, the city council of Broken Hill in New South Wales, Australia, had hoped to become the country’s first carbon-free city by 2030. About $415 million USD was invested in solar, wind and battery projects within 15 miles of the town of 19,000. These generators were supposed to supply enough electricity to power 117,000 homes. Then in October, a storm hit the region, destroying power lines connecting the town to dispatchable power from the New South Wales grid, and the entire town was plunged into rolling blackouts. While things gradually returned to normal over a few weeks, the region...

According to the lawsuit, the three asset managers acquired substantial stockholdings in coal companies, and then used their influence to pressure the companies to adopt ESG goals and reduce output. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, along with 10 other state attorney generals, have filed a lawsuit against BlackRock, State Street Corporation, and Vanguard Group, three of the largest institutional investors in the world. The lawsuit filed Tuesday alleges the firms conspired to artificially constrict the market for coal through anti-trade practices. “Texas will not tolerate the illegal weaponization of the financial industry in service of a destructive, politicized ‘environmental’ agenda....

Attorney General Ken Paxton sued BlackRock, State Street Corporation, and Vanguard Group, three of the largest institutional investors in the world, for conspiring to artificially constrict the market for coal through anticompetitive trade practices. Over several years, the three asset managers acquired substantial stockholdings in every significant publicly held coal producer in the United States, thereby gaining the power to control the policies of the coal companies. Using their combined influence over the coal market, the investment cartel collectively announced in 2021 their commitment to weaponize their shares to pressure the coal companies to accommodate “green energy” goals. To achieve...

Fortunately, the Constitution should still operate to prevent a leftist administration from handing to the UN American sovereignty and Americans’ rights. When five different people send you a link, you know that something very important has happened, even if the drive-by media aren’t trumpeting it on their outlets. In this case, it’s Robert Williams’ report at the Gatestone Institute that, in September, the Harris-Biden administration, without fanfare, adopted a UN pact that gives the UN and the World Economic Forum (“WEF”) control over American speech, foreign policy, and, possibly, internal sovereignty. Thankfully, while the administration can sign someone’s name on...

By getting governments to over-regulate farming, elite oligarchs like Bill Gates and Klaus Schwab aim to take control over food production in the name of sustainability. Besides ‘degrowth’ and ‘net zero,’ one other dangerous buzz phrase being bandied about by proponents of the Great Reset is “nature-positive food systems.” The stated goal of moving to new food systems is to reduce nitrogen emissions, livestock production, and meat consumption. This is to be achieved by consuming plant-based products, lab-grown foods, and insects (as a source of protein). The moot question, however, is whether such a change is at all necessary? The...

It didn’t take long for the eco-zealots to strike again. Just minutes after JustStopOil activists Phoebe Plummer and Anna Holland were jailed for throwing Heinz tomato soup over Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers,” a trio of JSO protesters have again targeted the artist’s work at the National Gallery in London. How very tiresome… The climate protest group tweeted out a video of the group’s latest stunt, urging Brits to “support people in resistance.” The clip of the art attack, which was recorded this afternoon, shows passers-by remonstrating with the JSO activists. Shouting at a room of livid art enthusiasts, the protesters raged:...

Scientists are mad as hell and demand their claims of looming climate catastrophe are taken seriously. That’s the message released Sunday by a loosely federated global network of scientists and academics who plan “high levels of disobedience” to highlight what they say is a planet in decay. Members of Scientist Rebellion told AFP their non-violent actions are timed to coincide with an upcoming report from the U.N.’s climate science advisory panel laying out options for slashing carbon pollution.

A pair of climate protesters was arrested Wednesday after allegedly spraying the Stonehenge monument in England with orange paint, according to local authorities. The protesters, from the group Just Stop Oil, sprayed the monument with orange paint Wednesday, one day ahead of the Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, the environmental activist group said in a statement on the social platform X. The two individuals were “demanding the incoming government sign up to a legally binding treaty to phase out fossil fuels by 2030,” Just Stop Oil said. Wiltshire Police told The Associated Press...

After years of disruption and vandalism, consequences have finally arrived for "Just Stop Oil" protesters. I'm not just talking about some motorists throwing them out of the street either, as satisfying as that usually is. This time, actual prison sentences were handed down. In October 2022, two women entered the National Gallery in London and threw soup onto a famous Van Gogh painting. They then glued themselves to the wall while ranting about climate change. Video of the incident went viral at the time. Phoebe Plummer, 23, and Anna Holland, 22, were arrested for their deeds, though it wasn't immediately...

“Net Zero” — That’s the two-word slogan that has been adopted as the official goal of every virtuous state or country for decarbonizing its energy system. The “net” part is backhanded recognition that some parts of the energy system (like maybe air travel or steelmaking) may never be fully de-carbonized. Thus some kind of offsets or indulgences may need to be accepted to claim achievement of the goal. But the “net” thing is not for the easy parts of decarbonization. And by the easy parts, I mean the generation of electricity, and the powering of anything that can be run...

EMIGRANT GAP, Calif. — Parts of Interstate 80 in Placer County are closed Monday morning after an electric big rig caught fire east of Nyack, the California Highway Patrol said. Drivers are being kept off the interstate for at least half a mile in both directions because the Tesla truck's battery was on fire, said Jason Lyman, a CHP spokesperson. The toxic fumes are an inhalation danger, he said.